by jessica kim woodward

Barrow Gurney Mental Asylum, Bristol

The 260 acres of woodland which this derelict mental asylum is spread over was bought in 1928 as inner city wards struggled to handle the numbers of patients arriving. By 2004 only 3 of Barrow Gurney‘s wards remained open, in 2005 the hospital was named the dirtiest of its kind in the UK; with inspectors noting cigarette burns on the floors, graffiti on the walls and waste staining the floor. The report, combined with the collapse of a ceiling upon a patients head, finally brought the hospital to a close for good in 2006. There are (or maybe were) some vague plans to turn the area into a 220 bed care home ‘village’, however, almost half of the buildings today remain standing: another wealth lost in the rubble.